


No place I'd rather be

by Ailendolin



Series: Lost and Found [2]
Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Aftermath of Violence, Angst and Feels, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Hugs, Hurt/Comfort, Idiots in Love, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Injury Recovery, Torture, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-21
Packaged: 2019-03-21 06:43:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13735323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ailendolin/pseuds/Ailendolin
Summary: “Hey, beautiful.”Her heart aches when she hears the old, familiar greeting from their Academy days. It’s been years since he used it.The war is over. Katrina and Gabriel finally have the time to talk about what happened to them during the last year.Sequel toWhat hurts the most





	1. 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys! Since I got so much kind feedback to my other Katrina/Gabriel story (thank you so, so much for that!) and I left Katrina in a rather dark place in that one I decided to write a sequel and put things right for her. It's going to be two chapters long and I'm actually considering making a trilogy out of it if there's interest. 
> 
> There's no particular need to read the first story "What hurts the most" to understand this one. You just need to know that Prime!Gabriel came back from the Mirror Universe with Mirror!Katrina, taking our Katrina completely by surprise and making her think her Gabriel would be better off with the other her. 
> 
> "Spoilers up to and including Episode 1x14 "The War Without, the War Within"
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters mentioned here and make no profit with this work. The characters and settings are property of CBS.

**No place I'd rather be**

**Chapter 1**

In the end they win the war. Her part in the final showdown is small, insignificant and painful. She’s on her way to the bridge when all hell breaks loose and they are boarded without warning. It’s just her luck that she’s one of the first to encounter a group of Klingons that manages to sneak onto the ship. All alone in a hallway that seems to stretch endlessly in both directions she knows she stands no chance against them. Still, she puts up a fight and at least manages to kill three with her phaser before she is taken down by brute force. One of them tackles her to the ground and there’s a sickening crunch as he traps her arm beneath her own body. She watches as her phaser slides hopelessly out of reach. Even worse than the pain in her arm is the way he pins her down with one hand around her throat. Her mind flashes back to a similar moment and she freezes.  

The Klingon sneers at her. “Scared, little human?” he asks in heavily accented English.

She replies with her rank, name and serial number even though she can barely breathe. She’s not new to this game. She’s been trained for this and remembers that training even in her panic.  

The Klingon grins and without warning head-butts her. Her vision darkens and pain erupts in her head. It takes her a moment to bring her surroundings back into focus. The choking grip on her throat doesn’t relent when the Klingon turns around to look at the others. There’s a brief argument she can’t follow and suddenly more hands are reaching for her. She bites her lip bloody to keep from crying out as she is pulled up by her arms and pushed through the nearest door. The movement makes her nauseous.

She barely has time to register the room she’s in before she is thrown into a table full of science equipment, injured arm first. She topples over it and lands hard on shards of broken glass. Before she can catch her breath she is grabbed again. More pain follows and she isn’t surprised. The same thing had happened on the Klingon ship when she had been taken prisoner. They’d used similar simple but effective methods back then, too, to ensure she was incapacitated. It was only later that the torture devices had come into play.

There are no torture devices now and she knows they don’t have the time to occupy themselves with her for long, not if their objective is to take the ship. She wonders why they bother with her in the first place and don’t just kill her. But then again, mercy has never been a part of their game plan. She knows that better than most and they do their best to prove her right. They show no mercy when her broken arm is wrenched out of its socket. They laugh when they pull at her lower leg until it is twisted at an unnatural angle. They mock her when she curls up to protect her stomach and head from their boots.

Their cruelty lasts maybe two or three minutes but to her it feels like an eternity. By the time they leave and the door hisses close behind them she is bleeding, bruised and broken. Her head hurts with every beat of her heart. Her chest aches with each breath she struggles to take and there’s a horrifyingly familiar numbness to her legs that makes her eyes sting. Helplessly, she lies in a sea of broken glass and blood and barely registers the sound of the red alert. She tries to focus on it and uses every technique she’s ever been taught to keep her mind clear and level-headed but the pain and panic are stronger. Every breath she takes is harder than the one before and a part of her knows she needs to do something about that but she doesn’t know what.

Darkness creeps up on the edges of her vision and in her exhaustion she allows her thoughts to drift. It’s Gabriel’s face her tired mind turns to as consciousness is slowly slipping away from her. He’s smiling that smile that had only ever been for her and never failed to make her knees go weak. It’s full of warmth and love and unspoken promises. It’s home – always has been despite everything that happened between them.

She hopes he’ll be okay, hopes he’ll get to live a long and happy life with the other her because as far as she’s concerned he deserves all the happiness in the world. Her only regret is that she couldn’t be the one to give him that. She knows there’s nothing she can do about it now, no matter how much she wishes she’d told him how much he meant to her when she still had the chance, but it hurts nonetheless. She’s been carrying that pain around with her for years and she just wants it to stop.                

The room around her darkens and the red alert fades into silence. Her mind goes blissfully blank as she loses the fight against unconsciousness. It’s the most peaceful she’s been in months.

* * *

She doesn’t expect to wake again but when she does it’s to a world of flickering lights and agony. There are hands on her body that prod and poke in painful places and she tries to recoil from the touch. It makes everything hurt even more. A blurry face enters her line of vision as she tries to breathe through the pain.

“Kat? Kat, can you hear me?”

She forgets all about her aching body at the sound of his voice. “Gabriel,” she whispers hoarsely. “You’re alive.”

A small, sad smile pulls his lips up. “I am and I am fine,” he reassures her and she closes her eyes in relief. “Hey, look at me, Kat, alright? You need to stay awake.”

She forces her eyes back open and blinks at him, trying to bring him into focus. Someone touches her dislocated shoulder and she can’t suppress a whimper.

“I’m sorry, Admiral,” she hears her own voice tell her. She sluggishly turns her head and catches the worried look her mirror self sends Gabriel. “We need to get her to sickbay now.”

“Our transporters are offline,” Gabriel says quietly.

She knows that isn’t good. Despite the fog that’s clouding her mind she begins to recall the final battle against the Klingons and can’t help but ask, “Did we win?”

Gabriel’s attention turns back to her. “We did. The plan worked, Kat. The war is over and L’Rell is leading the Klingons now.”

“Good,” she rasps. Her eyes fall close of their own accord as months of pressure lift from her shoulders. A warm hand settles on her cheek and she leans into the touch. She hasn’t noticed how cold she is until now.

“Eyes open, Kat.” Gabriel reminds her. His voice sounds closer and she follows his command even though it’s difficult and she just wants to sleep. “I know it’s hard but you have to stay with me, alright?”

His words trigger a memory she’d tried so hard to forget. “I wish you’d said that twenty years ago,” she whispers despite the nausea she feels.

His eyes soften and he bows his head even closer to hers. “Your career would have been over, Kat. I couldn’t do that to you, not after you fought so hard to make captain. You would have hated me for it in the long run.”

“I could never hate you,” she says shakily, needing him to understand. “I loved you so much. I still do.”

He gently leans his forehead against hers, mindful of her injuries. It’s a painful reminder of what they used to share but she’s too tired and too hurt to deny herself the comfort it still brings her. It doesn’t last long anyway. There’s a flurry of movement out of the corner of her eye and then a voice says, “Please step out of the way, Captain Lorca.”

Unable to comprehend what is going on, she reaches for Gabriel in her panic. She barely notices the pain in her broken fingers as they find his hand and hold on tight. The thing she does notice is the tears in his eyes. She has no idea why he would cry and she hates seeing him in pain, especially when she suspects it’s her fault.

“Admiral?” someone asks her and she forces herself to turn her head away from Gabriel and towards the source of the voice. The room spins around her and bile rises in her throat. “Do you know who I am?”

She blinks and fights against the nausea. “Dr. Culber?”

He gives her a warm smile that’s no match for Gabriel’s. “That’s right. Now, we need to get you to sickbay but the transporters are not working so we’ve got to carry you there. I’m sorry but it’s probably going to hurt.”

“It’s okay,” she reassures him faintly. “I’ve been through worse.”

He stares at her for a moment with a look in his eyes he can’t decipher. Then he nods to the people around him and she feels hands slip beneath her body. “Alright, on three. One – two – three!”

She bites her lip bloody again trying not to scream as they lift her onto a stretcher. Her upper body is in pure agony while her lower body is still terrifyingly painless and numb. She tells Dr. Culber as much once they’ve settled her on the stretcher, trying to keep the panic out of her voice.

“We’ll look into that once we’re in sickbay,” he tries to reassure her.

It doesn’t work. The last time she had injuries like these they’d put her in an induced coma and had her on an emergency transport to Starbase 88. There are barely any starbases left operational now and none of them is within shuttle range. Even confused and in shock as she is she knows what that means for her. Tears fill her eyes.  “Gabriel?” she asks in a small voice.

“I’m right here, Kat,” he says at once and for a moment that’s enough. With her broken fingers she reaches for his hand and holds on tight as the stretcher is lifted up. The movement jolts her shoulder and makes her squeeze her eyes shut so tightly against the pain that a few tears escape.  

“Can’t you give her something for the pain?” Gabriel asks, clearly upset. She wants to comfort him but it takes all her strength to breathe through the agony she’s in.

“Only once we’re in sickbay and I’ve stabilized her,” Dr. Culber says in regret.

“Can’t you see how much she hurts?” Gabriel’s asks angrily. Ignoring her pain, she turns her head towards him even though it makes her dizzy. With the last bit of her strength she squeezes his hand. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. I always am.”

She feels his fingers slip away from hers as her eyes fall close. The steps of her stretcher bearers quicken and she’s dimly aware of someone telling her with increasing urgency to stay awake but the voice is too far away and she just wants to sleep. Knowing Gabriel’s safe, knowing they’ve won and that it’s over, is enough for her to finally allow herself to rest.

* * *

The first thing she notices as she regains consciousness is that she’s cold. She opens heavy-lidded eyes and groans against the bright white light. Turning her face away from it her blurry gaze lands on a head of tousled blond hair that’s resting peacefully on a pair of arms folded on her bed. Her hand, heavily bandaged, is almost close enough to touch.

“He’s been with you since you came out of surgery,” a familiar and at the same time strange voice comments gently from her left. She squints against the lights as she turns her head. Her own face is smiling down at her. “Computer, dim the lights 30 %”.

The room darkens mercifully and she sighs in relief. “Thank you.” Then, hesitating a little, she adds, “Katrina.” It feels weird addressing – well, essentially herself, like this.

Her mirror self chuckles softly. “It’s good to see you remember who we are, but please call me Natalie. Everyone else does. I find it makes things a little less confusing.”

She frowns, feeling more confused than ever . “Natalie?”

“It’s my middle name,” her mirror self explains.

“I don’t have a middle name,” she says. Her head hurts and she’s wondering if she possibly suffers from memory loss. “Do I?”

The eyes of her other self soften. “No, you don’t. It’s one of the more obvious differences between you and me. I was named after my grandmother. She died a week before I was born in an attack on one of our outposts.”

Images of her own grandmother come to her mind. She sees a grey-haired woman, strong and fierce and full of love and kindness who always put the needs of others before her own. “I lost my own grandmother when I was twenty-eight,” she whispers.

Natalie smiles at her softly. “Maybe you can tell me about her one day.”

To her own surprise she’s willing to consider it. So far she’s stayed as clear as possible of her counterpart. It wasn’t out of animosity or suspicion but simply because she’d lacked the time to come to terms with her arrival yet. She’d had enough on her plate with the war and the betrayal of the other Lorca that she couldn’t afford to linger on her feelings regarding her other self and what her presence in this universe would mean for her. Coming face to face with her now is not as painful as she’d feared it would be. She wonders if that’s because of the heavy pain medication they surely have her on.

“How am I?” she finally asks, bracing herself for bad news.

“Let me ask you a few questions first,” Natalie says. “Tell me your birthday, the name of your parents and the town you were born in.” She does without having to think about it. Her other self nods as she enters some information into a padd. “Do you know what year it is and where you are?”

This time it takes her a little longer to reply. For the past year she’s had trouble remembering the date because every day had seemed the same, with one battle following another and another and another in an endless series of death and destruction. At one point she’d stopped bothering to keep count. “The year should be 2257, assuming I haven’t been unconscious for months. Also, I’m still in sickbay on the Discovery if I’m not mistaken.”

Her other self smiles at her. “You are not. You’ve missed about a week of partying and celebration but that’s it. Glad to see your memory seems to be intact. We weren’t so sure with the concussion and cranial trauma you suffered.”

“We?” she asks. For the first time she wonders why her mirror self is here instead of one of Discovery’s doctors.

“Oh, Dr. Culber and I,” Natalie explains. “I don’t know if you had the time to read my file before all this went to shit …” She shakes her head and her other self goes on. “Alright, so the short version is I’ve got years of medical training and experience but I never got my degree thanks to the Emperor. Dr. Culber was kind enough to allow me to work here and make myself useful.” She picks up her medical tricorder and switches it on. “Now, let’s see how you are.”

She lies perfectly still as Natalie moves the tricorder over her body. She feels her heart rate accelerate together with her breathing as the tricorder hovers a little too long over her hips and legs. Finally, her mirror self closes it and puts it away. “Okay,” she says, “I’ll keep it brief since you look like you’re not going to be able to stay awake for much longer. Your left arm was broken and dislocated. We fixed that but it’s going to take a little time to heal. I’m pretty sure you’ll regain full mobility though. There were several bruised and broken ribs we took care of, as well as some internal bleeding. It’s your legs we were worried about most.” She pauses. “I don’t know how much you remember but one of them was twisted and crushed really badly. Had we found you but half an hour later you would have lost it.”

“But you saved it?” she asks in a trembling voice.

Her mirror self nods. “Dr. Culber performed a miracle on your leg, but I’ll be honest with you, Admiral. You’ll walk with a limb for the rest of your life. No more marathons for you.”

She knows Natalie is trying to lighten the blow a little for her sake but the news doesn’t bother her as much as it probably should. There’s only one thought running through her head. “I’ll walk again?”

“You will,” Natalie smiles. “The numbness you felt in your legs when we found you was due to a spinal cord injury. It was similar to what you suffered during your imprisonment but luckily not as severe. We repaired it during surgery.”

She looks up into her own face, feeling relieved and ridiculously happy. She reaches for Natalie who gently clasps her hand with both of hers. “Thank you,” she says in a quiet but heartfelt voice. “Thank you so much.”

Natalie holds her gaze for a moment. “Any time, Admiral.” Then she flashes her a grin. “Two Cornwells are better than one, after all.”

Much to her surprise this startles a laugh out of her. She can’t even remember the last time she laughed this freely. “I’m beginning to think you’re right.”

Her other self winks at her. “Cornwells are always right.”

“Can’t argue with that,” a third voice says all of a sudden and they both turn their heads to look at Gabriel. His eyes are still soft from sleep and his hair sticks up in all directions. She finds herself falling a little bit more in love with him, something she’d thought impossible after all these years. “But we do have to work on your manners. It’s not very polite to let me sleep while you two catch up.”

Natalie rolls her eyes at him. “You’re going to survive it,” she says. “And since we’ve got all the medical details out of the way you’ll get her all to yourself now, so stop complaining.” Ignoring Gabriel’s indignant huff her mirror self’s gaze turns to her. “Get well, Admiral. I’ll be back later to check on you.” Before she walks out of the private room, she adds with a wink, “Don’t hesitate to kick him out if he bothers you.”

“There are moments when I regret my life choices,” Gabriel grumbles before he gets up from his chair so he can perch on her bed. Mindful of her injuries he reaches for her bandaged hand. “Hey, beautiful.”

Her heart aches when she hears the old, familiar greeting from their Academy days. It’s been years since he used it. “Hey, handsome.”

He smiles. “It’s good to see you awake. You gave us all quite a scare.”

“Sorry,” she says. She can barely feel the motion of his thumb on the back of her hand but it’s comforting nonetheless.

“Not your fault,” he says. “How do you feel?”

She mulls that over for a moment. “I ache all over but it’s dull and far away. Mostly, I’m just tired. And cold,” she adds as an afterthought.

He frowns and stands up, looking around. “There’s got to be more blankets around here somewhere.” She watches in tired amusement as he rummages through the room until he finds what he’s looking for. Grinning triumphantly, he holds up a thick woolen blanket. “Ha! This’ll do for now. I can go by your quarters and get your grandma’s quilt later if you’d like.”

She’s too exhausted to be surprised that he remembers how she used to wrap herself in her grandmother’s quilt for comfort. “That would be nice,” she says quietly. She watches in silence as Gabriel carefully spreads the blanket over her and fusses with it until he’s satisfied no toe or finger peeks out from under it.

“Better?” he asks.

She nods, feeling warmth spread through her. “I am. Thank you, Gabriel.”

“Always,” he says. She knows it’s a promise he won’t be able to keep but at that moment she doesn’t care. She’s so tired of always giving and sacrificing and managing without the support of others that just this once she’ll allow herself to take what is being offered. The last time she woke up in a hospital bed she’d been utterly alone with her pain and thoughts of betrayal. She’s grateful it’s different this time.

“Natalie said you’ve been here for a while,” she says as he sits down again.

A light blush dusts his cheeks and he reaches for her hand beneath the blanket. He meets her gaze and shrugs. “No place I’d rather be.”

Her heart skips a painful beat at his words. She’s willing to take his hand in friendship again but anything else will just inadvertently get her stupid hopes up and she can’t have that, not now when she feels small and vulnerable. “Please don’t say that, Gabriel.”

“Why not?” he asks simply. His blue eyes bore into hers. “It’s the truth, Kat.”

“It’s too much,” she says and lets her exhaustion show.

“You know we have to talk about it someday …” he reminds her softly.

She closes her eyes tiredly. “But not now. I’m tired, Gabriel. I … I just want to sleep.”

“Then sleep,” he whispers, reaching up to brush a strand of hair out of her face and her eyes close of their own accord. The gesture is so gentle and loving that she wants to cry. She blames it on the medication.

The urge to give in to the pull of sleep is almost overpowering but she forces her eyes open once more. “You don’t have to stay,” she tells him.

“Kat,” he says a little exasperated. “I’ve already told you there’s no place I’d rather be than here by your side. But if you want me to go I will. Do you?”

She can’t lie to him. “No,” she whispers. “I don’t want to be alone.”

He smiles at her and leans over to place a gentle kiss on her forehead. “Then don’t worry about me. Just rest. I’ll be here when you wake up.”

This time it’s a promise she knows he’ll be able to keep.


	2. 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would like to thank everyone who left kudos and comments very much for doing so! Getting feedback always makes my day and since we're still a pretty small fandom I am very happy that my fellow Kat/Gabriel Fans like my story. I really hope you enjoy chapter 2 as well! =)

**Chapter 2**

A week later she’s back in her quarters and they’re a day away from one of the damaged, but at least partly operational starbases of the Federation. She’s on her couch with a blanket and her grandmother’s quilt wrapped around her, watching the stars fly by. There’s a slight twinge in her recently broken and dislocated arm as she reaches for a cup of hot cocoa but apart from that her injury doesn’t bother her much anymore. 

Her leg is an entirely different matter, however. A brace keeps it stabilized and she feels a constant, throbbing pain even when she’s resting it - and there’s not much else she’s doing these days. She’s still relying on a wheelchair to get around because her shoulder and arm can’t take the pressure of the crutches yet. It’s tiresome but she is too grateful she still has a leg that can pain and inconvenience her to complain.

Her door chime alerts her to a visitor just as she takes the last sip of her hot cocoa. She didn’t expect anyone to come by this late. A little surprised, she calls, “Come in.” A smile pulls her lips up as she sees who it is. “Gabriel.”

“Hello, Kat,” he smiles back at her. “I’m not disturbing you, am I?”

She shakes her head. “Of course not. Come on in.”

The door swishes shut behind him and he doesn’t hesitate as he walks over to the couch and sits down beside her. They’ve come a long way from their last talk in these quarters. It no longer makes her uncomfortable to have him close and she doesn’t flinch at his touch anymore. The days they spent together in sickbay were good for them, she thinks. It makes her hopeful for the future.

“I’ve got something for you,” Gabriel says with a cheeky grin, pulling her from her thoughts. From behind his back he produces a little brown ball of fluff.

She laughs, something she’s been doing a lot more in his company lately. “Is that Merkin?”

“We found him locked in a cage in one of the storerooms,” Gabriel explains as he holds him out to her. “Looks like the other me did have at least one redeeming quality since he kept him around,” he adds wryly.

She raises a skeptical eyebrow at him, thinking back to the day his mirror self held a phaser to her head. “That’s debatable,” she decides. Instead of lingering on it she turns her attention to the tribble and pets him gently. To her delight he starts to purr. “Hello, little guy. It’s good to see you again.”

Merkin trills in response and gets comfortable at her side. His little purrs, she finds, are just as soothing as they were all those years ago when Gabriel first brought him home. She regards the tribble for a moment as memories of happier times flash through her mind before she takes a deep breath and turns to Gabriel. “You didn’t just come here to bring me a tribble for comfort, did you?”

Gabriel shakes his head. “I was wondering if we could talk.”

“About us?” she asks quietly, already knowing the answer. She’s surprised he waited this long to begin with to bring the subject up again.

He nods. “I think it’s time, don’t you?”

She does but that doesn’t mean she feels ready for it. She knew this moment would come but now that it’s here she feels scared. Over the last few days Gabriel had wormed his way back into her life and her heart and she’s afraid of losing the tentative truce between them. She’s not sure her heart could take that. Ridiculously, she has the urge to pull the tribble closer to her. “Alright, how do you want this to go?” she asks bravely.

“How about we start by filling each other in on what happened while I was gone?” he suggests. “I can go first if you want.”

She shakes her head. “Let me?” she asks. “I’m afraid I’ll lose my nerve if I don’t.”

His smile is as kind and understanding as she hoped it would be. “Of course.”

So she tells him all about the other him, and it feels strangely freeing. He’s the first person she can tell the whole story and not just the Starfleet-friendly version of events. She fills him in on the destruction of the Buran (and doesn’t miss the flicker of pain on his face), on the psych evaluations that found their way onto her desk and how she hardly recognized him in them. She talks about the worry that kept gnawing at her and led to her first meeting with the other Lorca. “I asked him if he remembered the time we watched the perseid meteor shower together. He didn’t,” she tells Gabriel, refusing to meet his eyes. “In retrospect, that was the first big clue that he wasn’t you. And I ignored it because you – he … he made a proposition I should have refused but didn’t.”

“Why not?” Gabriel asks softly.

“I tried telling myself it was because it was the perfect way to get close to him and find out what was wrong, why he was so different. It was obvious he needed help,” she says. “But honestly? I just … I missed you, Gabriel. We hadn’t seen each other in years, not really, and he … he said all the right things at the right time. He even made me blush, can you believe it? I was so smitten and I wanted –“ She pauses, looking down at her hands in guilt. “I wanted,” she whispers in defeat.

One of his hands comes up to rest on hers. “It’s okay, Kat.”

“No, it’s not! Nothing about it was even remotely okay,” she says angrily. “At the time I had no idea why it didn’t feel like … like making love. With you I always felt safe when we were together. With him it was nothing like that. It was cold and impersonal and afterwards I just felt empty and, and used. And then he turned away from me, something you never did, and I didn’t understand what was happening, why everything was so wrong.” She takes a deep breath trying to calm her shaky voice. It doesn’t help. “When I reached out to touch some scars on his back I’d never seen before I startled him. He turned around, pinned me to the bed with a hand around my throat and a phaser to my head. I thought he was going to kill me. He apologized at once but I was so … so angry – at him, at myself, at the universe in general. I couldn’t recognize this person in front of me and he saw that. In that moment I became dangerous to him and his mission, someone he couldn’t fool completely. It’s why he never sent a rescue team for me when I was taken prisoner. I was a threat and it was pretty convenient for him I was out of the way.”

She shakes her head in disgust – for him, for herself? She doesn’t know – and for the first time notices how hard she is gripping Gabriel’s hand. She releases it with a guilty, “Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize, Kat,” Gabriel says, retaking her hand with both of his in reassurance. “That whole experience sounds horrible.”

“You know what the worst thing about it was?” she asks, finally daring to look at him. “I didn’t even realize he wasn’t you. How could I not know that?”

She feels him squeeze her hand. “How could you?” he asks quietly. “Kat, you said yourself we hadn’t seen each other in years when you met him. For all you knew at the time I had just been through a major traumatic experience. Of course I’d be different after losing my ship and my crew. Don’t be so hard on yourself. You realized something was off about him – that’s more than anyone else did. And you paid the prize for it.”

She shudders at his words and feels a twinge in her lower back. It’s one of many reminders of the changes the other Lorca wrought in her life. Her gaze strays towards the bedroom and she feels bile rise in her throat. “You know, I still can’t sleep in that bed,” she says before she can stop herself. Gabriel turns his head to follow her gaze. “I know it’s ridiculous. It’s just a bed, after all, but I can’t. I feel ants crawling up my skin just looking at it.”

Gabriel’s eyes soften. “You’ve been sleeping on this couch the whole time, haven’t you? That’s why all the blankets and pillows are here.” She nods. There’s no use in lying. He knows her too well, even after all these years. “Why didn’t you tell someone?”

“What was I supposed to say?” she asks helplessly. “It’s not something that made it into official records, Gabriel. And at the time Discovery had just come back from the Terran universe, lost her captain and landed in the middle of a long and bitter war. The last thing the crew needed was a commanding officer who was scared of ghosts. I already lost my composure once in front of them. I couldn’t afford to do so again.”

“Well, you’re not their commanding officer anymore and the war is over,” Gabriel points out gently. His thumb begins to stroke the back of her hand with soothing motions and she feels warmth spread through her. “You’re allowed to not be okay now.”

She gives him a sad smile. “No, I’m not – not when Starfleet Command has been all but wiped out. We’ve got a lot of rebuilding to do, a lot of decisions to make, a lot of –”

Gabriel holds up his hand to stop her. “What I’m trying to say is you don’t have to stay in this room any longer if it makes you uncomfortable. My quarters have a perfectly good bed you can use. A couch is hardly the place to recover from your injuries.”

His offer surprises her. The thought of finally leaving these quarters behind and getting a good night’s rest in a bed that’s not haunted by past mistakes is more than a little tempting.  “What about you?” she asks.

“I’ll take the couch, of course,” he says smoothly, one side of his mouth curling up in a smile. “I’m not recovering from injuries, after all.”

“And Natalie?” she dares to whisper. It hurts but she has to know.

“Has her own quarters,” Gabriel says without hesitation. He holds her gaze. “Did you know she’ll be leaving for Earth after our debriefings?”

She’s surprised to hear that and her eyes fall to the pile of padds on the table. “There are a lot of reports I still have to catch up on,” she admits. Unable to hide her unease, she asks, “Will you be going with her?”

Gabriel shakes his head and a knot of tension uncurls in her stomach. “My place isn’t with her,” he says. “Natalie and I, we needed each other in her universe, I’m not going to lie about that. She was on her own, hurt and being hunted by the Empire. I was stranded and had no idea where I was. It was a mutually beneficial alliance and she’s a lot like you, so that helped. But that’s the point, Kat: in the end she isn’t really you, just like you said, and she shouldn’t have to try to be. It’s not fair to her that I only see you when I look at her. She deserves someone who loves her for who she is and not for whom she resembles, and I’m not that person.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispers when he runs out of words. “I really hoped you’d find happiness with her.”

“I know you did and maybe, if we’d never found a way home we might have. But we’re here and it’s not her I want to be happy with, Kat. It was never her,” Gabriel says earnestly. His words make her heart thump almost painfully in her chest. “It wasn’t her I stayed with for a week, hoping and praying to every god I’ve ever heard of that you would wake up and be okay. While the rest of the ship celebrated the end of the war I sat in sickbay, holding your hand just like I’m doing now. You were all I could think about. You, Kat, not her. The thought of leaving you alone, even just to take a quick shower, was almost unbearable.” He gives her a small smile. “Remember that time I had to be hospitalized because of a stomach flu?”

The change of subject startles her but she nods. “Yes. I was stationed on the Deliverance and you were on Earth for … something I can’t recall now.”

“It was a xenobiology conference,” he tells her fondly. “But that’s not important now. What matters is that the moment you heard of my situation you requested leave from your captain and hopped onto the next transport to Earth. All of that, just to be with me and watch me puke.” She snorts at that and his eyes soften. “I think we both know why you did that at the time. It’s the same reason why I wouldn’t leave you when you were hurt. Thirty years in-between and nothing has changed.”

“Gabriel,” she says around the lump in her throat.

He places a gentle kiss on the back of her hand that leaves a tingling in its wake. “These last few days I’ve thought a lot about what you said to me when we found you. Do you remember that?”

She does. For the first time in decades she’d told him how much she regretted accepting her promotion and ending their relationship. That’s something not even a head injury could make her forget. She nods at him.

“That day, when you got your first command, I was so happy for you,” he recalls. “It was about time you got the recognition you deserved. You worked so hard for that, sacrificed so much and you earned it, Kat. It never even crossed my mind that you’d be willing to throw it all away for us until you brought it up.”

“You didn’t take it well,” she recalls.

“No, I didn’t.” He sighs. “I’m sorry for that. I realize now that I pressured you into a decision you weren’t ready to make – a decision I didn’t even want you to make. I thought it would be selfish to ask you to stay with me at Starfleet Headquarters. I thought you would come to resent me if I asked you to decline the commission.” He pauses and looks at her. “But that’s what you wanted, wasn’t it? That’s what you came home to tell me that day,” he says quietly.  

He looks so forlorn and regretful that it’s her turn to squeeze his hands in comfort. “I worked hard for that commission, you’re right about that,” she begins. “But by the time it was offered to me I wasn’t the same person who set out on that path. I hadn’t even realized my priorities had changed until they offered me the command of the Beagle. I remember standing in that room at Headquarters and feeling nothing. No joy, no excitement, no happiness. And do you know why? Because I knew that commission meant I’d have to leave you behind. It was in that exact moment that I realized having you by my side was more important than any ship, any career, could ever be.”

She watches as he bows his head in shame. “And I pushed you away.”

“And I let you,” she says softly. “It’s as much my fault as yours, Gabriel. I should have tried harder to talk to you about it. I just – I didn’t know how to, not anymore. Things were so different after I came back from … from _that place_. You were treating me like glass, I had trouble coming to terms with what had happened to me, and somewhere in-between we became strangers. And by the time we finally began to pull ourselves together that damn promotion came up and I didn’t know what to do, how to make things right.” She swallows hard and feels tears well in her eyes. They’d never talked about this before and it takes all her strength to finally say what she should have said twenty years ago. “I just knew I didn’t want to leave you, Gabriel, but you urged me to take the commission and … and insecure as I was about everything back then I thought you’d given up on us. And I couldn’t even blame you, not with … not with –” She breaks off, biting her lip in a desperate attempt not to cry, and gestures helplessly at her stomach.

“Oh, Kat,” he breathes, shocked. Carefully, oh so carefully as if she’s something precious and not broken, he leans closer and wraps his arms around her, mindful of her leg. It’s the first embrace in decades they share. His arms are warm and familiar and it feels so good to be able to hide from the world for a little while. “It was never about the fact that you can’t bear children. God, I’m so sorry I made you think that.” She can’t keep the tears from spilling over when she hears him say that. A weight she’s been carrying for almost half her life finally lifts off her shoulders as he tightens his arms around her. “I thought I’d be holding you back if I asked you to stay and I was so sure that you’d wake up one day and hate me for it. It didn’t even cross my mind that you would assume it was because of what they did to you. I had no idea how much you were struggling with it. If I had … God, Kat, I’m so sorry. I was so stupid.”

He breaks off and buries his head in her neck. She gently rubs his back as she feels his tears on her skin. “This is not just on you, Gabriel. We were both through a lot. We both needed more time to deal with it all – time that Starfleet didn’t grant us.”

She feels him shift and pull back a little, trying to pull himself together. “Is it too late now?”

“What?” she asks in confusion. His eyes are as damp as hers but bravely bright with hope. She wonders what he sees in hers.

“Is it too late to ask you to stay?” he whispers. “To try again?”

She forgets how to breathe. Her shock must show because he brings up both his hands to frame her face and gently brush away the tears that well up in her eyes. Slowly his words sink in. Her heart, old and weary as it is, stutters in her chest before it starts to beat furiously against her ribcage in anxious hope and fear. She’s scared to love again. Their past is a long and complicated one and that’s nothing one talk is going to change. There are things she can still barely speak about, even after twenty years – things about her he deserves to know. There’s the matter of the other Lorca and the fear of intimacy he left her with – something she hasn’t had time to come to terms with yet. She’s not the woman he once fell in love with and she’ scared he’s going to realize it one day.

But, underneath all her worries and fears and insecurities, there is a soft warmth she hasn’t felt in years. It’s tentatively spreading through her and leaves a tingling feeling in its wake. Even though she hasn’t felt like this in a long time she knows what it is: Love, happiness, hope. She holds onto that feeling as best as she can and refuses to let it go. She will not be ruled by her fears, not again, no matter the consequences. This time, she will fight for her future.

Still, she can’t help asking, “Do you really mean that?”

“I do, Kat,” Gabriel says earnestly and relief rushes through her. “Of course I do. I’d never lie to you about that.”

“Then I don’t think it’s too late,” she whispers.

He looks at her for a moment with so much love that she wants to melt. Then his face splits into one of those grins of his that always meant trouble. “You don’t sound so sure. We could always consult a fortune cookie …”

“Oh, don’t you dare!” she laughs through her tears and swats his arm. She hadn’t known how much she’d missed his stupid and inappropriate jokes until now. “I’ve already phasered one bowl of the little buggers into nothingness and I will do so again if I have to.”

He holds his hands up in defense and chuckles. “Alright, no fortune cookies. Got it.”

“Good,” she says. Her grin softens into a smile. “And for the record? I’m sure, Gabriel.” Happiness lights up his face and she hates herself a little for holding up her hand and putting a dampener on it. “But it won’t be easy. You know that, right? We’re not the same people we were all those years ago. It might not work out in the end.”

“Do you love me?” Gabriel asks in a quiet, serious voice.

 “I do,” she says, smiling and blushing at the same time. “Very much so.”

“Good,” he says and leans closer until their foreheads touch, “because I love you, too, Kat. That’s all that matters right now. We’ll figure out the rest tomorrow.”

He sounds so sure that all the worrying thoughts in her mind fall silent. His hands move from her face to the back of her head and that’s the only warning she gets before he leans impossibly closer and brings their lips together in a soft kiss. It feels like coming home and is both achingly familiar and excitingly new. She deepens the kiss as her own hands come up to find that little spot behind his ears that never failed to make him groan. She’s delighted to see that hasn’t changed.

A moment later, much to her regret, he breaks the kiss with a gasp and leans back a bit. His eyes are bright and a little star-struck. She loves that look on him. “Wow,” he breathes, smiling that smile that is just for her. She bites her lip and feels her face heat. “Here I was planning to take it slow but – wow!”

She feels flattered and almost giddy with happiness but his words remind her that they shouldn’t rush into things. She doesn’t know about him but she’s not ready to take this any further, not with the memory of the other him still so vivid in her nightmares. So she removes her hands from his face and brings some distance between them. “We should take it slow,” she says a little regretfully. Her smile, however, doesn’t dim. His doesn’t either.

“Well, you probably shouldn’t kiss me like that again, then,” he teases with a grin. They stare at each other, both lost in the happiness of the moment, before his eyes soften and he asks, “So, we’re doing this, huh?”

She reaches out to card her fingers through his hair before she gently cradles his cheek in her hand. “Looks like it. Who’d have thought, huh?”

“Thought maybe not, but always hoped,” Gabriel tells her with a soft smile and turns his head to place a small kiss on her wrist.

Between them, Merkin trills in agreement.

* * *

She spends the night in his quarters, in his bed and in his arms. There’s a moment of confusion after they brush their teeth and get ready for bed when he moves to make his way to the couch. She’s grateful for his consideration of her boundaries but him on the couch is the last thing she wants. There’s taking it slow and then there’s depriving themselves of comfort and closeness. So, with a soft touch to his wrist and a warm open smile, she says, “Stay with me?”

“Are you sure?” he asks and she loves him all the more for it.

“I’m sure,” she says, patting the empty space next to her. “No fortune cookie needed for that.”

His lips quirk up in a small smile. He holds her gaze for a moment before he nods and moves around the bed. She watches as he slides under the covers and turns to face her just as he used to. She’s relieved to find nothing of the wrongness she felt with the other him as she looks at her Gabriel now. There’s only warmth and love and a sense of security that’s been missing from her life for far too long. She wants to drown in the feeling.

“Can I hold you?” he asks quietly.

She closes her eyes and nods. “Yes. Please.”

Her injured leg makes it a little difficult to get comfortable but they manage. One of his arms comes up around her back and pulls her close while the other lightly rests on her side. She lays her head on his chest and feels herself relax. His breath tickles her skin and his heart beats a reassuring rhythm beneath her ear. It’s almost intoxicating to have him so close to her after all these years. She wonders how she ever managed without him.

“Is this alright?” he breathes softly, sounding on the verge of falling asleep.

She huffs out a quiet laugh. “It’s more than alright. I’ve really missed this. You.”

“Me, too,” he admits. She feels him press a fleeting kiss to her hair. “Goodnight, Kat. Sleep well.”

For the first time since the war, since her imprisonment and torture, since the betrayal of the other him, she thinks she might be able to. Her hand searches for his in the darkness.

“Goodnight, Gabriel.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! There's a few notes I have in regards to this story that I thought I'd share for anyone who's interested. 
> 
> (1) The only thing we really know about Kat and Gabriel's backstory is that they go way back and feel a mutual affection for each other, perhaps love. But as Jayne said on After Trek, their careers came first and there was no time for a relationship. So, in this story I tried to come up with a backstory that would explain what happened to them. Which brings me to point 2.
> 
> (2) "What you are experiencing are the effects of past trauma. I know it doesn’t feel like that, believe me. What you’re seeing is just a memory. […] They didn’t break you then so they are not gonna break you now." These are Kat's words to Ash on the Klingon ship during his panic attack. The second sentence and the way she pronounces it really stuck out to me when I rewatched that scene because (at least for me) it implies that she's not just talking as a psychiatrist here, but as a survivor - someone who has been through a trauma before and speaks from experience. I don't know if someone else interpreted that scene in that way, but it's where the idea for this fic came from that Kat went through something horrible several years ago which was part of the reason why she and Gabriel broke up. 
> 
> (3) Now, I didn't want to go too much into details regarding said trauma in this fic, but for those who are interested my headcanon is this: imagine Commander Cornwell on a diplomatic away mission. Things go wrong, she and a couple of others get captured. They're being experimented on and by the time they manage to escape there is some damage not even Starfleet Medical can heal and all her dreams of starting a family with Gabriel are destroyed. After an extended period of medical leave she is promoted to captain for getting her people out of that place.
> 
> (4) I also headcanon that both Kat and Gabriel didn't initially start out as wanting to make a career out of Starfleet. Kat obviously has a background in psychology or something similar and I took Mirror!Lorca's interest in creatures as a clue that our Gabriel might be interested in Xenobiology. At one point in their lives they both switched onto the Starfleet career path though Gabriel remained a scientist at heart and only did so half-heartedly while Katrina was determined to become a captain. Gabriel only started his rise through the ranks once he and Katrina broke up. 
> 
> Some of those things will probably be explored or at least mentioned in the third installment of this series. I haven't started writing on it yet but there's another Kat/Gabriel story that's almost finished and may well start its own series, so there's that. 
> 
> Thanks again for reading, guys!

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! For anyone wondering why Dr. Culber is in this story: I wrote this before the finale aired. Obviously, he didn't come back in that episode but since this is fanfiction let's just say some sporey stuff happened around the time our Gabriel came back, resulting in Hugh being returned as well. 
> 
> The second chapter will probably be up by tomorrow or the day after that. Get ready for some much-needed talking, some backstory to Kat and Gabriel's relationship and, most-importantly, finally some happiness for Katrina =)
> 
> Also, if anyone wants to say hi on tumblr, you can find me [here](http://ailendolin.tumblr.com/)


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